The annual Push Square Towers tradition is back, as we sit down our scribes and pester them once more for their five favourite PlayStation games of the year. With such a strong assortment of software in 2018, it’s always tough deciding upon the cream of the crop. We threatened to confiscate Jamie's retro consoles before he sent us his...

Push Square has pondered the infancy of 3D console graphics during the 32-bit era, and reflected that the ageing process was not always visually kind, especially to PSone launch games. Some early titles like Jumping Flash! hide their pixelated wrinkles behind bright colours and plain models, while others like Battle Arena...

Even twenty years ago, any love felt towards PSone Rayman's luscious art style could quickly turn into hate due to its spikily relentless difficulty barrier, but a cathartic sense of satisfaction could also be found by perseverant gamers who endured to conquer all eighteen of its levels. As a December 1995 EU launch...

"Play History. Make History." The marketing tagline for the 2018 release of the PlayStation Classic highlights an added attribute of the miniature console in the sense that all 20 games included may not actually be classic PSone games, yet even the less worthy inclusions provide gamers with a snapshot of playing...

Spencer Mansion, set deep in Raccoon Forest, looming loftily in the Arklay Mountains, is the true star of Resident Evil. The colossal and creepy house setting of the game was inherited from Capcom's 1989 Famicom title Sweet Home, but it was Resident Evil on PSone that popularised the survival horror...

Unsung heroes are prominent in literature and film. Without spoilers, consider if Frodo had embarked on his quest without Sam's support in The Lord of the Rings, and think about nerdy Neville Longbottom's overlooked role in protecting the wizarding world of Harry Potter. The true heroes behind this Castlevania...

The 16-bit console wars were merciless. During the early concept stage of the PlayStation console, Sony took part in an ill-fated collaboration with Nintendo to create a CD-ROM add-on for the SNES. In September 1995, Jumping Flash! was a PSone launch title, and it's the type of game that makes you wonder what would have happened...

Not only is Castlevania: Rondo of Blood my first pick when playing a traditional-style Castlevania arcade platformer, but Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is possibly my favourite PSone game of all time. It’s conventional for gamers to play spookily themed titles during...

Don’t hang up! We have a little business proposition for you. Push Square propose that any retro gamer with a love of side-scrolling beat-‘em-ups make it their business to play the Capcom Beat 'Em Up Bundle, particularly as a historical jaunt through an impressive display of seven cherry-picked...

Republished on Wednesday 29th August 2018: We're bringing this review back from the archives following the announcement of September's PlayStation Plus lineup. The original text follows.
A tiny team of developers with an independent spirit and a vision of creating a game that’s inspired by classic science fiction...

In our third article following Push Square’s visit to Firesprite, we sent one of our retro enthusiasts who was particularly eager to learn more about the links between its studio’s history with Psygnosis and Studio Liverpool. In time for the launch week of the sci-fi horror game The Persistence we also...

I felt well situated to visit Firesprite to play its PlayStation VR stealth horror game The Persistence for Push Square recently. I’m local to Merseyside, so travelling from my home to its Liverpool office took twenty minutes in total. I’m also a keen retro gamer, and once I had the fascinating opportunity to talk to...

Push Square recently visited the Liverpool city centre base of the independent studio Firesprite in the sunny North West of England to discuss The Persistence, which in the words of Game Director Stuart Tilley is a “brutal, sci-fi, stealth horror roguelike” game releasing on PlayStation VR next week. We sat...

It's an indication that 2015 has been an impressive year for games, when a Rocksteady Studios Batman: Arkham title doesn't break into the Game of the Year Top Five list, and settles for a respectable seventh place from Push Square instead. Even its E3 2015 trailer was overshadowed beneath the cowl of amazing announcements that preceded...

Transformers: Devastation's 2015 launch possibly missed out on PlayStation 4 sales by releasing in the same October week as Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection, so to discover that Platinum Games' single player brawler title – with a five hour game length – has achieved eighth place in Push Square's Game of the Year...

One thing that Nintendo and Star Wars share as a brand is devoted loyalty from their fans, and this can partially be attributed to the immense nostalgia that gamers and film buffs feel from experiencing true excellence. On the 21st November 2015 the Japanese Super Famicom celebrated its 25th birthday, and the SNES earned its name...

How could a developer solve a problem like a desire to build a side-scrolling platformer in a 1996 3D graphics obsessed world? The answer was to find a middle ground, which we affectionately refer to as 2.5D today. Published by Crystal Dynamics and created by Toys for Bob in Novato, California close to the...

A game can be an interesting representation of its generation without being beautiful, timeless, and artistically ageless. Released on the EU's PSone in April 1996, GEX was loud, brash, and in-your-face, but so were films like Point Break and ska-punk bands such as Assorted Jelly Beans during the 1990s...

Every gaming generation has a few genre styles that are dominant, and in the early 1990s scrolling shmups, brawlers, and cutesy mascot platformers were the most prevalent titles on a game shop's shelves. Julian 'Jaz' Rignall was prophetic in his editorial for the February 1991 issue five of Mean...

Republished on Tuesday, 29th September 2015: We're bringing this review back from the archives to celebrate the PSone's big 20th Anniversary in Europe today. The original text follows.
Originally published on Saturday, 12th October 2013: When the magazine reviews of WipEout landed a month after its September 1995 release,...

It's apparent that the PlayStation 4's 2015 gaming year will most notably be remembered for a handful of exemplary AAA open world games, but pulsating under the radar there has also been a fine array of pixel art 2D games released on the console this year. With examples like Shovel Knight and Super Time Force Ultra, this is partially...

Republished on Thursday, 4th December 2014: We're bringing this review back from the archives to celebrate the PSone's big 20th Anniversary this week. The original text follows.
Originally published on Saturday, 19th October 2013: It can be a tough life being a PSone retro game. After all, you were fresh and...

Welcome to Push Square’s all-encompassing Games of the Generation series. In the lead up to the PlayStation 4’s release later this week, we’ll be rounding up our writers in an effort to look back at some of their favourite PlayStation 3 games. These titles have been hand-selected personally by each individual author. This time, we're...

Forget the smoke, smog, and stench, the most challenging aspect for an eighties or nineties arcade to recapture is the wonderful way each coin-op would bustle together to create an electric attack on your senses. The noise, the flashing lights from each blinking screen, and the buzzing of gamers towards video game...